A short history of Spider-Girl
(and why we care)
Back in 1998
Tom DeFalco wondered what it would be like if Peter had a baby who grew up to be a hero. In conference calls between Bob Harras and Ron Frenz, the story was given life in What If? (Volume 2 issue number115) ironically a comic book periodical that was destined for cancellation shortly thereafter. The outpour of support from the fans inspired further adventures in this alternate future. Planned originally to be distributed to Wal-Mart store in “comic bags” of three comics each, Tom and Ron drew up the blueprints and molded the original Marvel Comics 2 (MC2) books which included Spider-Girl, J2 and A-Next in the first year, and Wild Thing and Fantastic Five planned for the second year. (Plans for the third year included The Buzz and possibly American Dream). Tom modeled Mayday’s behavior and relationship with her father on a niece of his.
Regretfully the Wal-Mart distribution plans were scrapped, and all MC2 titles except for Spider-Girl were scrapped along with them despite the fact that at the time the MC2 books were selling phenomenally well in the market. Fan interest and support, where enough to preserve Spider-Girl from cancellation with issue #17.
In the first year of the MC2 there was A-Next and J2. Both ran for 12 issues.
In the second year, there was Wild Thing and The Fantastic Five. The MC2 imprint was cut short in the second year, and so both series only ran for 5 issues.
There were two limited series at the start of the third year. Darkdevil and The Buzz. Both ran for 3 issues.
In 2005, Last Hero Standing ran for five issues.
In 2006, the “sequel” to Last Hero Standing will be Last Planet Standing.
According to all official sources, each cancellation was indeed genuine. Although the series is constantly under threat of cancellation, the most serious incidents came during:
The first cancellation attempt was…
issue #12. At that time, all MC2 titles were supposed to run for 12 issues, then get “cancelled” and a brand-new set of titles would run for 12 issues. This happened with A-Next and J2. However, Spider-Girl was by far the most popular title, and it was decided that Spider-Girl would continue and MC2 would get two new titles (Fantastic Five, Wild Thing).
The second attempt was #17. This was done behind the scenes. Fantastic Five and Wild Thing were both cancelled at #5, and Marvel was debating whether to end the entire MC2 line (which would mean Spider-Girl would be cancelled at #17). John Byrne accidentally let the cat out of the bag, claiming that his “Spider-Woman” was selling better than “Spider-Girl” because Spider-Girl was going to be cancelled as of #17. This caused a brief outrage from SG loyalists, and the “powers” at Marvel had to rush out and smother this rumor before it got out of hand. So Spider-Girl was “uncancelled” again. (Ironically, Spider-Woman itself ended being cancelled after its 17th issue, and was extended an extra issue to allow John Byrne to wrap up his storylines.)
The first public cancellation attempt was with #38. The members of the Spider-Girl Message Board got word out, and a massive petition and letter-writing campaign was set up. www.save-spidergirl.com was first established. This saved Spider-Girl.
Marvel cancelled Spider-Girl again with #50. Again, the Spider-Girl Message Board got involved. Marvel eventually decided to “uncancel” Spider-Girl, but only after raising the cover price from $2.25 to $2.99. Marvel also decided to do this for other lower-selling titles such as Black Panther and Captain Marvel, which led to the whole “U-Decide” debacle between Peter David, Joe Quesada, and Bill Jemas.
#61 was cancellation attempt #5. This time around, Marvel tried to be sneaky about it by cancelling the title for a full month before announcing it to the fanbase. However, the outpour of support for Spider-Girl had convinced Marvel that there was some value in the name “Spider-Girl.” Marvel tried to do a “bait and switch” by creating a new “spidery female” character and calling her Spider-Girl. When the internet fandom got a whiff of this, they immediately brought it to public light, which forced Marvel to change its plan. So Mayday kept the “Spider-Girl” name while the new character went unnamed for a few issues (her title was called “Amazing Fantasy”) before getting the name of Arana. In an attempt to make “Spider-Girl” more appealing to the beancounters, Marvel imposed new guidelines on Spider-Girl (longer storylines designed for TPBs, which brought us “Season of the Seprent” and “Marked for Death” as well as generic covers). This helped extend Spider-Girl’s life for a few more years.
And now, #100 is the next cancellation attempt.
Why do the fans fight so hard for the book?
The experience of many Spider-Girl fans for the book is that, unlike various reinterpretations and reinventions, Spider-Girl is actually a direct continuation of the Spider-Man story. The inherent goodness of the character endears Mayday to many readers, and the stories and continuity that it draws from appeals to many fans of “old school”. The stories are compressed, easy to follow, complicated in structure, and provide a great experience to the fans of the book.
The creative team listens to the fans, and constantly strives to improve the book. Readers who give the book a try right now will be hooked.
It’s a book that no parent would be fearful to hand to their child, and it’s enjoyable by boys, girls, men and women. It seeks to embrace a wide audience. Many who truly wish that the comics industry would break out of the direct market see this book as great model of what comics used to be and could be again.
In short, it is the perceived uniqueness of Spider-Girl and the MC2 which many fans feel are precious enough to defend because that which is precious is often rare.
Ron Frenz once said that the relationship between Spider-Girl fans and the creative team was reminiscent of the relationship Stan Lee enjoyed with the fans. This is not wholly accurate. Shared adversity and a common struggle to promote and improve conditions bring with it over time unbreakable bonds of camaraderie and strong feelings of solidarity between the fans and creators. “This is OUR book and OUR creative team!”
As all these qualities are generally attributed by many fans to this one, single book, and since Marvel seems so casual about its demise and apathetic towards its continuation, many fans feel a pressing urgency to defend this book like no other comic published today.
